Climate News 25:21
Setting aside the professional disappointment in Australia’s new unambitious climate targets, it’s worth thinking about what impact they might have, if any, upon public opinion and perceptions.
Public opinion on the need to act on climate change responds to a range of external events, including obvious climate impacts (e.g. Black Summer bushfires), lack of government action (e.g. the previous Coalition government) and setting targets (e.g. the 2022 targets set by the current Labor government). While there’s often strident debate and an increased focus on climate change as an issue in the lead up to the establishment of targets, here’s less of a clear link once targets are being updated. Public support for action on climate change often declines in public polling when people perceive that the government is getting on with the job of responding. The difficulty for those of us who wish to go further is that it is harder to make an argument for more vigorous action when there is already action taking place. It was frustrating to have a near apocalyptic vision of Australia’s future in the projected climate scenarios in the National Climate Change Risk Assessment at the start of the week and such modest targets at the end of the week. In terms of public perception, none of this may matter. Politically, the Federal Government may have judged this right in terms of its understanding of what the Australian public understands and wants to do on climate change. It’s modest in the worst possible way. It’s inadequate to the scale of the threat and does little to shift the conversation to a point where Australians might better understand what’s coming their way and how and why we must act now.
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